Revolutionary Groups


Alexander Pushkin, Mikhail Lermontov, Nikolai Gogol, Alexander Herzen

In the last lesson you looked at Alexander II's reforms. These reforms affected all levels of society but, as you have read, in most cases they did not go far enough. Alexander was known at the beginning of his reign as the 'Tsar Liberator". The first half of his rule was a time of unique intellectual activity in Russia. Great Russian writers and composers flourished during this period. Musical composers like Tchaikovsky and Rimsky-Korsakov and writers such as Dosteoyevsky, Tolstoy and Turgenev published their works. However, the period of liberalisation and reform did not last long. A combination of factors brought an end to Alexander's reform program.

  • In 1863 there was a Polish rebellion which demanded self-government. The revolt was brutally put down.
  • The relaxation of censorship led to open criticism of autocracy by political writers and intellectuals, especially among the young, and a flood of demands for further reforms. revolt was brutally put down.
  • Some of these groups resorted to violence as a means of forcing change. Such a group was responsible for an attempt on Alexander's life in 1866, the first of many such attempts.

By 1866 Alexander had returned to repression and had re-introduced aspects of the 'Nicholas System' including; censorship of the press, tight government control of education, restrictions on travel and further reductions in the powers of the zemstva. In short a re-introduction of the police state.

Revolutionary Groups
The intellectual debate between the Slavophiles and the Westernisers continued but was now influenced by the ideas of socialism. These groups questioned whether Russia should follow the path to Western industrialisation or build a uniquely Russian form of socialism based upon the village communes or mirs. There was general agreement among the intellectual leaders of Russian society on the need to end the system of autocratic government and to limit the powers of the Tsar. There was, however, no agreement on how this should be done. The philosophies which dominated the revolutionary groups from the 1860s onwards were:

  • Populism
  • Nihilism and Anarchism
  • Marxism

The Populists
The Populists or Nardoniks (men of the people) were mainly young, noble or wealthy middle-class intellectuals. They were moved by the poverty of the ordinary people, especially the peasants. They were influenced by the ideas of Alexander Herxen who was disgusted by the living and working conditions of the urban working class created by industrialisation in Europe. For him the only answer was socialism. Herzen believed that a uniquely Russian form of socialism could emerge based upon the village commune or Mir. Landowners would lose their land which would be re-distributed among the peasantry. The tsarist government would be overthrown and replaced with a democratic republic. The Populists believed that the peasants only needed leadership to rise up against the landowners and the government.

In 1874 over two thousand university students made a massive effort to cause this uprising. In a movement called "To the People" they left the cities and went to live in the countryside with the peasants. Their slogan was 'Land and Liberty'. They made little impact on the peasants who did not understand the Populists or sympathise with their aims. The peasants had always been loyal to the Tsar. They blamed the landowners and the bureaucrats for their miserable conditions. The Tsar was known as the 'little father' and the peasants believed that he was deeply concerned for their welfare. Thus, the peasants were suspicious of the educated youths who talked about revolution. In some cases they turned the Populists over to the police. The secret police viewed the movement as a revolution and arrested many of the leaders. In 1877 there were two mass trials of these young revolutionaries many of who were exiled to Siberia.

The Demise of the Populists
The failure of the "To the People" movement to achieve a peasant revolution split the populists into two groups:

  1. The People's Will - a terrorist organisation which resorted to acts of violence to get rid of the government. They assassinated many government officials, some government ministers and eventually Alexander II himself but they failed to bring about a revolution. This group went on to be the basis of the powerful Socialist Revolutionary Party which was formed in 1900.
  2. The Black Reparation - those populists who did not believe in violence. This group led by George Plekhanov aimed at land distribution but later turned to Marxism and Plekhanov went on to be a founding member of the Socialist Democratic Party in 1898.

The Nihilists and the Anarchists
Both groups were active at the same time as the Populists but were more radical in their ideas. The Nihilists rejected all forms of authority in the name of freedom. Nihilism was a movement of ideas rather than a political organisation and it helped to undermine tsarist authority. Its attitude of defiance appealed to the young who suffered under the restrictions of tsarist repression. The Nihilists published many papers critical of the tsarist regime and contributed to Alexander's return to censorship as a way to end their attacks.

Some Nihilists progressed from ideas to violent action. Nihilists planned many assassination attempts and thousands were exiled to Siberia.

Anarchists took Nihilists ideas a step further. They believed in the destruction of centralised government and that society be organised only at local level. To this end they favoured terrorism and displayed a passion for destruction. A small group of anarchists was active in Russia in the 1870s led by Michael Bakunin and Prince Peter Kropotkin. They were associated with the destruction of property and the assassination of many government officials. Anarchism never had wide appeal among the intelligentsia and by the late nineteenth century had dissolved into other socialist groups.

The Government's Response
In the 1870s the revolutionary groups, despite their activities, had achieved remarkably little success. There is little to suggest that they would have gained significant support but this is just what did happen. Not because of their activities but because of the actions of the tsarist regime. As mentioned earlier the young revolutionaries involved in the 'To the People' movement were put on public trial in 1877. This proved to be a disaster for the government. The trials gave the revolutionaries exactly what they had lacked to this point - nation wide publicity. The trials lasted for months and the accused revolutionaries took the opportunity to make long impassioned speeches bitterly critical of the government which were well reported in the press. The idealism, integrity of the young students made a great impression on the public, the judges and the juries. Of 193 put on trial 153 were set free and the others were given light sentences. Worse was to follow.

The sentences were announced on January 24th 1878 and the following day a young revolutionary, Vera Zasulich shot and wounded the Governor of St Petersburg, General Trepov. Trepov had ordered the flogging of an imprisoned student who had refused to salute him. Zasulich was the daughter of an army officer and a member of the Populists. At her trial she said that she had acted out of a deep sense of moral outrage. She made a great impression of the public and the jury and despite the evidence was acquitted.

The verdict was a great shock to the government but the reaction of the people to the verdict came as a bigger shock. The verdict was greeted by tumultuous applause from the spectators. Large crowds waiting outside the court prevented the police from re arresting her and she was able to slip away to exile in Switzerland. The government realised that people who did not actively support the revolutionaries were at least more sympathetic to them than they were to the government. After 1878 the authorities announced that all cases of 'resistance to the authorities' would be held in special courts. There would be no more open trials for revolutionaries.

The Assassination of Alexander II and its effect on the Revolutionary Movement
There were eighteen attempts on Alexander II's life before his actual assassination in 1881. Despite opposition from non-violent Populists the "Peoples' Wlll continued their terrorist activities throughout the 1870s. In March 1881 they bombed the Tsar's carriage as he was returning home from a military parade. He was critically injured in the attack and died from his injuries some hours later. The assassination failed to topple the tsarist regime. Instead it had exactly the opposite effect. Most Russians were deeply shocked and outraged by the killing of their Tsar and the revolutionary movement was totally discredited as a result.

The Revolutionary movement after the assassination of Alexander II
There were three major reasons for discontent in Russian at the end of the 19thC:

  1. The poverty of the peasants and workers
  2. Autocracy and the lack of opportunity to participate in government
  3. The policy of Russification which was fiercely resented by minority groups in Russia.

By the end of the nineteenth century the revolutionary movement in Russia entered a new phase. The movements of the nineteenth dissolved into three main groups:

  1. The Liberals who wanted to share power with the Tsar in a constitutional monarchy
  2. The Social Revolutionaries who wanted a form of peasant socialism
  3. The Marxist who believed in a revolution based upon the ideas of Karl Marx.

Marxism in Russia
George Plekhanov, a former Populist, was the first exponent of Marxism in Russia. In 1883 he formed the Russian Marxist party and its first members were a small group of exiles living in Switzerland, including Vera Zasulich. These revolutionaries abandoned the Slavophil philosophies to follow the ideas of the Westerners.
Plekhanov criticised the notion that capitalism would not develop in Russia. He pointed out that capitalism already existed and that the numbers of urban workers were growing rapidly. He had no faith in the peasantry as a revolutionary force after the failures of the 1870s and argued that the urban proletariat was the only force that could transform Russia.
He rejected individual acts of terror as a means to achieve change. He believed that the workers, led by Marxist intellectuals, would eventually overthrow the Tsar and put and end to capitalism. A society based on the equal distribution of wealth and goods.
Marxist ideas spread slowly in Russia and existed only in small scattered groups. In 1898 these groups formed themselves into the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (or Social Democrats). This achieved a brief unity of Socialist opinion, though the party was to split, into two factions, in 1903.
Revolutionary Ideas
The ideas of political and social change in Europe in the nineteenth century were very closely linked with the concepts of liberalism, socialism and Marxism. These ideas influenced the Russian revolutionaries.
What is Liberalism?
Liberalism emphasised basic rights of the individual citizen that the state could not take away. These included the following:

  • Guaranteed rights to freedom of speech, the freedom to own property and freedom of religion
  • The right to participate in government through an elected parliament. (However, the right to vote and stand for parliament would be limited to men who owned property and had enough money).
  • Legal rights to defend themselves against government oppression
  • A constitution (set of rules) to guarantee these rights.

Liberals also believed in private ownership and a free economy with no government regulations. These ideas were held by the middle-classes. The economic theory of Liberalism is the basis of Capitalism.
What is Socialism?
Socialism - is an economic system where there would exist no privately owned property and the State should own and control:

  • All forms of wealth production that is, all land, mines, factories, and businesses
  • All transport, communications, power and welfare.

As you can see this is the opposite of Liberalism. Many socialists believed that changed would be achieved through elected parliaments.
What is Marxism?
Marxism is based upon the ideas of a German, socialist, philosopher, Karl Marx. He believed that:

  • Socialism could only be achieved by class conflict, or revolution, between the industrial working class and their employers.
  • The employers would exploit workers and when conditions became intolerable angry workers would overthrow their employers and create a socialist society where the means of production would be owned by the state and wealth would be shared equally among all members of society.

Exercise: Written exercise
Explain why the revolutionary groups of the 19th Century failed to bring about reform of the tsarist system.
Guidelines:
In your answer you should include the following:
  • The aims and methods of each revolutionary group
  • The people who made up these groups
  • The people who supported them
  • The methods used by the tsars to crush politcal opposition.